The Great Log Jam: How a River of Timber Threatened to Wash Away Snohomish
A massive tow of logs broke loose near Priest Point, sparking fears of a disaster that could have swept away the town's waterfront—and highlighting the precarious nature of life in the logging boomtown.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
There is a large lot of logs at Priest Point at the present time. A large tow, already made up, got loose last week and is lying night and day, nothing prevented it from going to sea, but for the fortunate arrival of log runners; some think that if a trustworthy man will be kept at the Point to look after the property owned by the loggers who are up river at their camps. The loss would not be trifling if every one interested was willing to pay his share proportional to his interest.
There is a large lot of logs at Priest Point... A large tow, already made up, got loose last week and is lying night and day, nothing prevented it from going to sea, but for the fortunate arrival of log runners; some think that if a trustworthy man will be kept at the Point to look after the property owned by the loggers who are up river at their camps. The loss would not be trifling if every one interested was willing to pay his share proportional to his interest.
In 1877, Snohomish was a volatile logging town where infrastructure was rudimentary and property could literally wash away overnight. Today, while we worry about climate change and river management, the core tension remains: the balance between industrial extraction (logging then, development now) and the physical vulnerability of communities built on the banks of the Snohomish River.
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